


Of Mattresses and Coffee Cups

by Aisalynn



Category: Once Upon a Time in Wonderland (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-15
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-29 11:46:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1005053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aisalynn/pseuds/Aisalynn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will cant sleep. And he really really hates Wonderland.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Mattresses and Coffee Cups

Will shifted uncomfortably on his spot on the grass. They were camped for the night, if “camped” was the right word for it. It wasn’t like they could have a fire—there wasn’t exactly a lot of wood around. The land surrounding the road they had been travelling on was made up of perfect, round mounds of perfectly cut grass, with perfectly pruned trees scattered exactly the same distance from each other. The trees themselves were nearly identical, only varying in size, and all across this hilly area there wasn’t a single fallen branch or twig to be found. 

God, he hated this place. 

He rolled over onto his side, trying to get more comfortable on the sloped ground, and thought longingly of the soft mattresses of home. Home. Maybe it wasn’t where he was from to begin with, but he’d had plans. Plans for a new life, a new beginning. And now here he was, in the exact place he never wanted to be again. 

With a groan he sat up. It was no use; he wasn’t going to sleep tonight. He looked over to where the rabbit was keeping watch higher up on the hill where the road could be seen. Still awake. Will had half expected him to fall asleep on the job, with as useful as he was in the mallow marsh situation. But Will could see the outline of him against the sky, upright and alert, ears twitching at the slightest sound. 

Will sighed and allowed his eyes to be drawn to the only other member of their party. Alice was curled up fast asleep under the only tree in their little chosen camp spot. As far as he could tell she had no trouble whatsoever going straight to sleep, unbothered by the lack of blankets or mattress or fire. 

Then again, as much as he hated this place, she seemed to love it. She wasn’t the meek, broken girl here as she was in the asylum he found her in. Here she was in her element: charging ahead through the woods, thick branch in her grasp and eyes bright and determined, climbing confidently up the gnarled trees to balance high on the branches with just her socks on her feet, snatching a dragonfly out of the air to find the way out of an impossible situation. There was no fear in her. Even though this world had changed since she left, she led the way, leaving him to trail behind her. 

She belonged here. Not in a world where no one understood her, believed her. A world that declared her insane and locked her away in a cramped little cell. She’d found her place in a world completely separate from the one she was born to. He envied that. Even if he called where he’d settled “home,” he didn’t quite _belong_ to it. He hasn’t belonged anywhere, not for a long time. 

Will tossed aside the handful of grass he’d been idly shredding as he thought and stood up, stretching out the ache in his legs. 

He really, really missed having a bed. 

The rabbit’s ears turned slightly in Will’s direction as he made his way up the hill, followed soon by his head and bright inquisitive eyes. 

“Couldn’t sleep,” Will mumbled in answer to the unasked question. The rabbit nodded and Will sat down beside him. He grasped another handful of the perfect, straight green grass and started shredding again. 

They watched the road in silence for a while. The hills and the unnatural trees made eerie shapes in the dark, and Will couldn’t help but think one more time about how much hadn’t missed this place at all. 

“Why did you come to me? “ He abruptly asked. 

The rabbit looked up. “What?”

“To help her. Why did you come to me? Surely there were other people who could have given her that message. She has friends in this world, or did, anyway. Why travel all the way to where I was just to take me to her?”

He could barely make out the shrug of the rabbit’s small shoulders in the dark. “You’re the Knave of Hearts.”

Will let out a frustrated huff. “You say that like it _means_ something.”

“Because it does.” 

Will shook his head and threw his handful of grass on the ground.

“Listen,” the rabbit continued, “I know who you are. And because I know who you are I know your history. I know exactly what she did for you. _And_ ,” the rabbit said louder when Will didn’t respond, “I know that there is nothing you wouldn’t do,” he nodded at the sleeping form near the tree below them, “for her.” 

Will looked back over at Alice. The glow of the pendant—her connection with Cyrus, he reminded himself—could still be seen underneath his jacket. (The jacket he had to practically force her to wear. So stubborn.) The light lit up her sleeping face, her hair, her hands--one tucked under her cheek and the other wrapped around the collar of the jacket, keeping it tight around her. He thought of turning around in the woods, boots and wishes still clutched in his hand, about journeys to find someone he wasn’t even sure was alive, about mattresses and cups of coffee and marshmallow marshes and wanted posters with his face on them. 

He didn’t disagree.


End file.
